Think of how much money you spend every month on Mailchimp, or Drip, or ConvertKit.
Do you send enough email to justify that continual cost?
Are you actually USING all those fancy features you pay so much for?
After coughing up $30 or $75 or $150 per month, do you say, “that was money well spent?”
If the answer to all three questions is yes, let me congratulate you; you’re obviously nurturing your list and turning fans into repeat customers on a regular basis. In other words, email is a pillar of your profitability.
If you’re NOT one of those artists yet, I have some bad news and some good news for you.
The good news involves you actually SAVING money while achieving better results whenever you email fans. But before we get to that, here’s the problem…
If you answered no to the questions above then the bad news may be obvious: You’re not driving enough revenue through your email efforts to justify the cost of a service like Mailchimp, Drip, or ConvertKit.
Don’t feel TOO bad. Most musicians aren’t.
You may be overpaying for your email tools because:
- You don’t schedule your emails
- You don’t automate emails (beyond a welcome message)
- You don’t create email sequences
- You don’t make enough sales offers
- You don’t prioritize growing your email list at gigs
- You don’t have an undeniable online lead-magnet to grow your list
- You don’t segment your list by region, sales history, or interests
- Or you don’t … send emails at all
Even in the age of TikTok and Spotify, email is still one of the most reliable ways to drive results for your music. Whether that be boosting streams, video views, or merch and ticket sales.
And yet so many artists underutilize their email lists. And here I’m not even talking about making use of advanced automation, sequencing, and segmentation features.
Sure, you probably SHOULD get around to doing that stuff at some point to maximize the potential of your list. But let’s be real; most artists suffer from a more foundational problem.
Musicians. Just. Don’t. Send. Enough. Email.
Let’s do a little exercise.
Think of a marketing list that you’re on. Some brand, shop, or artist who messages you multiple times a week, yet you’re still content to be on their list. Whether you open every email or not. You’re never offended by the frequency of their emails because you like the personality. You’re interested in the products. You dig the vibe.
Well, your fans probably like your personality and dig your vibe, too. So why are you only emailing them once a month, or twice a year, or… whenever you finally get around to releasing your next album??
It’s NOT an imposition to communicate with your audience more frequently. And it’s not an imposition to ask them to take a specific action: purchase merch, leave a comment, etc.
If the fan remains on your list, they expect to hear from you. If they unsubscribe, they weren’t going to stream your album or buy your vinyl anyway.
So forget fancy email features. Your biggest problem may be the simplest one to solve. Just SEND emails.
And if you can solve that problem, I want to show you how you may be able to cancel your monthly Mailchimp or Drip subscription, and get the same or better email results through Fan Reach, an email feature included with ReverbNation membership — which, depending on your membership tier, is FREE, $12.95/month, or $19.95/month.
Meaning even ReverbNation’s Premium membership is likely less expensive than your monthly email bill. PLUS ReverbNation membership includes plenty of other things besides email that you’ll need to succeed:
- global music distribution
- promo tools
- industry access to pitch your music for radio plays, playlist placement, label deals, festival slots, vinyl pressing, mixing and mastering mentorship, and much more
Let me set some realistic expectations though. Fan Reach does NOT have ALL the advanced email features you’ll find when you use expensive platforms like Mailchimp and Drip.
It’s designed for simplicity.
Fan Reach makes it quick and easy to build your list, and email the right segments of your audience. And as you’ll see below, that may be more than enough to find better results from your email marketing.
The three reasons most email marketing platforms are prohibitively expensive for the average artist
1. The more you use it, the more you pay
The reality is, you don’t need fancy automation and granular segmentation features to simply break bad habits and send more emails.
But with many email tools, the more emails you send, the higher your monthly costs.
That’s not the case with ReverbNation’s Fan Reach.
2. The bigger your list, the more you pay (whether you email them or not)
Another big issue with almost all email platforms? The more people you add to your list, the higher your monthly costs, whether you get around to emailing them or not.
You’re paying just to KEEP people on a list you probably underutilize. Talk about being punished for success.
Again, this isn’t the case with Fan Reach, where you can build your list in a more worry-free way. With a free ReverbNation membership, you can have 500 fans on your list. At the Basic tier, you can have 1000. And, for just a few more dollars a month, you can upgrade to the Premium level, which supports up to 50,000 fans on your email list, AND includes robust music distribution, unprecedented industry access, and promotion tools.
All for less than the price you might be paying to another platform JUST for email.
3. The more features, the more you pay (even if you don’t use ‘em)
Who cares if you’re allowed to have twenty different automated email sequences running if you’ve never even gotten around to launching the first one!
Many email platform tiers are priced as if you’re some enterprise brand with a huge team and endless needs. But more likely, you’re an artist, or a band, with a single list of fans. Plus the need to just write them simple messages once in a while, speak to them like an individual, and then ask them to do something.
You can do that with Fan Reach. No frills. No extra bells and whistles that you’ll never use anyways. Just real-time email messaging to your audience whenever you have news to announce, stories to share, music to launch, or products to sell. And the ability to target that email to the right people based on location, recency, and audience type.
And this gets me to the main point I want to make. That you CAN be MORE successful in driving results from email when you strip away the more intimidating, advanced features.
With email marketing, musicians can do MORE with LESS
That may sound ridiculous to marketing pundits. But here’s why I think there’s merit to the claim: Marketing experts give advice that is designed for the best-case scenario. It’s not grounded in reality.
They’re often addressing a hypothetical entrepreneur with lots of time to build and tinker. Sufficient budget to test products and craft messages. The expertise to tie all the digital components together. The willingness to study results and modify strategies accordingly. They’re addressing someone who view themselves as a business first, with the purpose of selling a product.
Does that sound like you? While you’re driving between gigs, spending hours to shoot a 15-second TikTok, trying to figure out how to sidechain vocal compression on your next home recording, changing the strings on your guitar?
If you’ve read this far, it’s probably NOT you — which is why you’re looking for a simpler and more affordable solution. You are an artist first, and to the degree that involves marketing your artistic products, well, you also have competing responsibilities… to tour, to make new songs, and so forth.
That’s why for a typical independent musician, email is usually an afterthought, something you think to use when there’s obvious news. And besides that it goes neglected. I’ll reiterate that there’s no sense in paying tons of money out-of-pocket month after month for a tool you underutilize.
Streamlining your music marketing with email
But I’ll go a step further. I think that when you strip away the intimidating features (automations and sequences, endless tagging and segmentation, designing an email campaign from scratch), you’re left with something much more intuitive and usable. All you REALLY need, if we’re being realistic, is a way to capture fans’ contact info, automatically deliver a welcome message, have a simple text box to occasionally write your fans, the ability to add a link, photo, or button, and hit send.
Enter Fan Reach! The real-time, streamlined email marketing tool for musicians that is already included in your ReverbNation membership, along with all the things I mentioned above: global music distribution, unlimited pitching for playlists, festivals, label deals, radio spins, vinyl pressing, mixing and mastering mentorship, and much more.
You can literally build and send emails in 2 minutes.
Just select what you want to talk about from the dropdown menu, and Fan Builder will automatically pull that song, album, video, or event into the email.
If you prefer to create a message from scratch, just select “Update to Fans.”
Then write your email.
Add any pics or links, if needed.
If you want to have a special design for your email, you can instantly choose from a list of templates.
Want further customization?
You’ve got it…
Want intuitive and instant list segmentation and email targeting?
You’ve got it!
Select which types of people from your audience you want to contact:
- Fans
- Artists / Musicians
- Labels
- Venues
- Promoters
Target your message based on location (or send it to everyone).
Choose whether you want to send it to newer subscribers (people added in the last 30 days), or everyone.
Then send it!
And yes, you can send a test email to yourself to check that links are active and the design looks good.
It’s really that simple.
And the simplicity is exactly what makes me suspect you’ll get MORE out of Fan Reach than you will by spending $50 or $75 or $150 every month on a more “pro” email platform.
Because you’ll actually USE this tool more often.
The easier something is, the less time it takes overall, the more you’ll think to use it. Not just for the big news announcements (album launch, new video, etc.), but the little moments too. Those quick messages where it’s enough to snap a picture at a gig, or on tour, and just write a couple quick sentences.
The way people are inundated with media these days, you’ll have an easier time getting someone’s attention if you send them much shorter emails, but more often.
Plus, quick real-time engagement with your list can be more effective because it often feels more personal. Emails sharing what you’re up to in the moment, or what you’re most excited about right now, are more natural to write. They’re easier to compose. And easier to send.
That’s why Fan Reach is perfect for sharing:
- A single, album, or video (with automatically embedded play button)
- Event details
- A story from the road
- Fun moments from your studio
- The meaning of your song lyrics
- A pic, link, recommendation, playlist, or social post
- A merch offer
- And anything else you can think of
Fan Reach is a foundational email list management and messaging tools to artists, and it’s already bundled into ReverbNation membership. You can easily import lists from other email programs or signup sheets from your concerts.
You can also capture contact info from your website visitors using our HTML 5 widget.
Want to build your list, nurture your relationship with fans, and boost your sales and streams?
Email is one of the most important marketing tools that musicians have. And email marketing doesn’t need to be complicated.
In fact, the easier it is, the more often you’ll communicate with your audience. Giving you more chances to connect, encourage streams, sell merch, and promote tours. Plus, the more you send emails, the better you’ll get at crafting effective messages.
And when it comes to email tools, don’t pay another service for something that comes included with ReverbNation!
Chris Robley
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